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Tuesday, March 13, 2012

Tiger Mascot Costs Too Much to Tackle

Nearly five months after Terry Thompson sent about 50 tigers, lions, bears, and other dangerous exotic animals to their deaths by setting them free in the community of Zanesville, Ohio, state lawmakers now have a bill in front of them to crack down on the problem of exotic pets. Senate Bill 310, introduced by Sen. Troy Balderson, R-Zanesville, is a serious-minded response to stop the flow of big cats, primates, bears, wolves, and crocodiles into private hands in Ohio’s neighborhoods, where the animals themselves suffer and pose a threat to public safety. Ohio is one of seven states with no rules governing private ownership of dangerous exotic wild animals.

Obie, the Massillon High School live mascotphoto: UNI-watch.com

The bill does, however, have a few gaps, and it should be toughened up to provide a more comprehensive policy reform to match the scale of Ohio’s problem. First, it provides a blanket exemption for private citizens associated with the so-called Zoological Association of America (ZAA), a front group for exotic animal owners that masquerades as a private accrediting organization (and a group not to be confused with the professional and credible Association of Zoos and Aquariums, or AZA). It would have been easy for someone like Terry Thompson to become accredited by ZAA, and that’s the problem. Second, it specifically allows people to acquire large constricting snakes, such as pythons, anacondas, and boa constrictors, as pets.

Additionally, the bill provides an exemption for school mascots, a provision carved out for the benefit of Massillon High School and its tradition of acquiring a new tiger cub, Obie, each year. It had appeared that allowing for an unending series of Obies was in the cards politically. But The HSUS and the Columbus Zoo expressed concern, and now today, Massillon’s local newspaper, The Independent, said “this is one tradition that the Massillon Tiger football program can and should live without.” The editorial continued:

There are just too many downsides to the live animal mascot, not the least of which is the chance—however remote—that a maturing Obie could somehow escape his keepers and attack someone or something….We can understand the resistance to legislation making it illegal to have a live exotic animal school mascot, especially when the Massillon program predates legal bans on exotic animals. But this law is not an attack on Massillon, our football traditions or individual rights. It’s an attempt to improve public safety born out of recent events at an exotic animal ‘farm’ near Zanesville.

The Independent is right that the Obie football tradition should be retired. And it’s not just for animal welfare and public safety concerns, but also for the fiscal impact and the costs involved to care for Obie’s needs long after his use during the few weeks of football season. Annual food costs alone can cost around $10,000 for a single tiger. With an estimated 20-year lifespan, that’s $200,000 to feed one Obie. Over the 43-year tradition that Obie has been on the sidelines at Massillon home games, that’s $8.6 million in Obie’s food costs alone. Someone has to pick up the tab, like a recurring annual signing bonus, and a mascot exemption for Obie would be an unfunded mandate by the Ohio legislature.

But captive tigers also require spacious, enriched, and secure housing, veterinary attention, and knowledgeable and experienced staff to provide proper care. Reputable sanctuaries typically spend more than $60,000 to construct housing and can spend up to $40,000 per year on care—an $800,000 commitment over the 20-year lifespan of each rescued tiger. After Obie spends a single season in Massillon and then becomes a free agent, he either goes to private animal sanctuaries that must assume these costs over time, or he goes to some horrid roadside zoo, or perhaps he’s sold into a canned hunting operation or to a wildlife parts dealer, so that tiger bones or penis can be sold for thousands of dollars. In just about every case, it’s a bad outcome for the tigers or the people who are enlisted to care for them.

Many Obies have been provided by Stump Hill Farms, a grossly substandard private menagerie with a long list of serious Animal Welfare Act violations, including citations for repeated failure to maintain and provide secure tiger enclosures, unsafe handling of a juvenile lion during public exhibition, declawing a juvenile tiger (a painful procedure that leads to chronic health problems), failure to provide veterinary care, and failure to vaccinate animals or even conduct routine parasite exams. After football season, some Obies have been returned to Stump Hill Farm or sent to Tiger Ridge Exotics, which has a similarly deplorable record of animal care.

It’s time to permanently bench this outdated, inhumane, dangerous, and costly tradition.